Microsoft | Internet Marketing Blog

Microsoft gives Universal a slice of Zune sales

In an attempt to gain advantages for its Zune music player over the almighty iPod, Microsoft has agreed a new deal with Universal Music.

This deal with give Universal a cut of the profits from sales of Microsoft’s iPod rival, the Zune. In return, Microsoft will receive rights to distribute content to Zune’s users for limited wireless sharing.

This could be a gamechanger for Apple, which has so far avoided cutting this sort of deal with content owners.

by Graham Charlton 09 November 2006 14:29pm 0 comments

Interview with Martin Stiksel of last.fm

Last.fm has become one of my very favourite web apps – it helps me find new music and figure out what I've been listening to most (Cocteau Twins, for the record).

I recently hooked up with Martin Stiksel, one of the company's founders, in last.fm's new offices near Old Street in London, to discuss progress to date and to find out more about the service.

The interview with Martin is right after the jump...

by Chris Lake 08 November 2006 11:18am 0 comments

Xbox gears up for online video downloads

Owners of Microsoft’s Xbox 360 will soon be able to watch and download a range of movies and TV shows through their consoles.

Microsoft has announced that it plans to rival Apple by renting and selling downloaded movies and TV shows through Xbox Live, though the video service may well be more about the console wars with Sony's PS3 and Nintendo's Wii.

by Graham Charlton 07 November 2006 16:36pm 0 comments

36 greatest Bill Gates quotes, just for Apple fanboys

Digg.com is having one of its Apple fanboy days, where every other story on the Digg homepage could have been submitted by the Apple PR department.

A story published by Wired on Steve Jobs' best quotes illustrates this, making it onto the Digg homepage and racking up hundreds of diggs in next to no time. As I write, there are no less than four pro-Apple stories in the top ten of Digg's technology homepage. Wisdom of crowds, huh?

We wondered what would happen if we balanced this view with a similar piece on Macboy nemesis Bill Gates. After the jump we've culled a bunch of Bill's quotes, 36 in total, including a gem about spider monkeys.

Bill Gates, dude...

Let the flaming begin...

by The Shredder 27 October 2006 16:44pm 4 comments

Report shows influence of internet on offline sales

New research once again proves the influence of the internet on both online and offline sales. A study has shown that 77% of electronics purchases are researched online before customers head to a store.

The results of the US-focused study indicates that online research time increases in line with product prices.

by Graham Charlton 27 October 2006 11:42am 1 comment

New flaw found in Internet Explorer 7

A flaw in Internet Explorer 7 has been found which could mask phishing scams, exposing surfers to the kind of risk that the browser was meant to have dealt with.

Security monitoring company Secunia discovered that IE7 allows a website to display a pop-up window which can contain a spoofed web address, which may trick users into accessing malicious pages.

by Graham Charlton 26 October 2006 15:27pm 0 comments

Visits to European job sites grow 11%

European visits to career-related websites jumped by 11% year on year in Q3, according to new figures from comScore.

The study showed sites dedicated to online career resources, job searches and training attracted 50 million visitors per month during the quarter, with Monster leading the category.

by Richard Maven 26 October 2006 12:54pm 0 comments

Mozilla releases new Firefox 2.0 to compete with IE7

Just a week or so after Microsoft launched Internet Explorer 7, Mozilla has released the new version of its open source browser - Firefox 2.0 - prompting some people to suggest that the browser wars of the ninieties are back on.

Features of the new Firefox browser include phishing protection, which reports if a web site may be malicious; session saving, which restores windows or Firefox tabs if the browser crashes; improved access to Web feeds; spell checking; and search suggestions.

by Graham Charlton 25 October 2006 11:12am 0 comments

Tube could be giant viral music network

London Underground commuters would interact using mobile phones and station-side wireless hubs under a project aiming to turn the tube transport system into a city-wide song-swapping network.

by Robert Andrews 23 October 2006 17:27pm 0 comments